General Computer Science
These books are mostly focused on computer science, but many of
them also have excellent sections on Artificial Intelligence. The
information on computer science is also quite crucial to understanding
Artificial Intelligence.

This is an excellent textbook for learning many concepts
of computer science. It covers many interesting topics that
relate to Chess and Go programming such as linked lists, hashing,
stacks, queues, networks, and trees. It has many pictures and
diagrams to help explain everything clearly, and it gives
code frameworks for programming the algorithms. It is quite a
good reference as well.

The
New Turing Omnibus

This book is almost completely theory and math, but it
is very thorough and explanatory. Many interesting topics show
up including minimax tree searches, encryption, error correcting,
and artificial life. It has a large amount of material on Turing
machines, finite-state machines, and NP-Complete problems. It's
a great book for an overview on many aspects of theoretical computer
science, and it also makes a handy reference.

Selected
Papers on Computer Science/DT>

Written by the famous Donald Knuth, this book is a sampling
of Knuth's less technical works, ranging from the relationship
between Computer Science and Math to the early history of Computer
Science, from Babylonia to John Von Neumann. His conversational
tone makes this an enjoyable, easy read.

Cognitive Science
In order to build an intelligent system that can emulate or even
exceed human intelligence, it is very important to first understand
human intelligence itself. In recent years, great strides have been
made in the field of Cognitive Science -- the study of human thought.
In particular, the areas of Linguistics and Vision have made stunning
progress, resulting in such programs as Dragon NaturallySpeaking.

Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid

Although it is categorized in this site under Cognitive Science,
this Pulitzer Prize-winning book touches on everything from music
to chemistry to mathematcs and philosophy. It isn't a systematic
study of the human mind, but it is a book of musings and profound
ideas about human thought that have their applications in
many different fields even today, more than 20 years after it
was published. Entertaining, thought-provoking, and easy-to-read,
this book has introduced many to the wonders and joys of the human
mind. It is very much recommended.

How
the Mind Works

This
best-selling
book
tries
to
summarize the current situation
of Cognitive Science. The author avoids technical jargon,
but still manages to present some astounding examples and explanations
of a variety of mental phenomenon, from visual illusions to the
reason memory fades. All throughout the book, the author tries
to defend the Computational Theory of the Mind; he is only moderately
successful at this, sometimes dancing around the point, but that
shouldn't stop you from enjoying the plethora of content this
book can offer.

The
Language Instinct

This is a very easy-to-read book that's full of information
on the progress of linguistics after Noam Chomsky's brilliant
work. It dispels common myths and illuminates all kinds of new
hypotheses to the public. The reading is not very technical, so
the book is a great introduction to linguistics for anyone.

Game programming
These books cover how to program Go, Chess, and other games. Some
of these books are analyses of board games from a mathematical or
computer science oriented point of view, while others are concerned
with the AI of games.

AI
Game Programming Wisdom

This book is a great addition to the game programming community.
It deals with AI concepts that can be implemented in
games, such as pathfinding algorithms, finite state machines,
decision-making algorithms, and even the genetic algorithm.

Mathematical
Go

This book covers the endgame of Go using combinatorial game
theory. If you haven't already learned combinatorial game
theory, it tries to introduce the topic gently, but it can get
confusing sometimes. There are a few misprints scattered throughout,
but this book, I think, is still worth the money. It has an excellent
coverage of the mathematical rules of Go, and it is quite good
at defining sente and gote in mathematical terms.

The
Turk: The Life and Times of the Famous Eighteenth-Century Chess-Playing
Machine

This engrossing history examines the craze and philosophy surrounding
the Mechanical Chess-Playing Turk of Wolfgang von Kempelen,
and correlates it to the modern movement with Artificial Intelligence
and Chess computers. In the process, the book examines both machine
intelligence and human relationships to seemingly intelligent
automata.

AI and Artificial Life
These books cover general topics in Artificial Intelligence as well
as topics in Artificial Life and cellular automata (such as Conway's
Game of Life).

A
New Kind of Science

Stephen Wolfram's controversial new book claims that cellular
automata will completely change the face of all of the sciences,
and that for the past 300 years, science has been doing things
wrong. Some claim that this book is astoundingly refreshing, others
dismiss it as inconsequential and overhyped. The book is written
in fairly non-technical language, although if you want
to delve into the details, appendixes and notes are filled with
extra information.

The
Emperor's New Mind: Concerning Computers, Minds, and the Laws
of Physics

The controversial book by Roger Penrose, a leading mathematician
and physicist. The book tries to refute once and for all the
theory of "Strong AI", which believes that AI can,
eventually, create a computer with a mind of its own on the par
of a human mind. As can be seen from the title, the book delves
into a wide range of topics including AI, philosophy, mathematics,
and physics.